Donald Trump said he will not attend next month’s Super Bowl in northern California, citing the distance to the game, amid an ongoing culture-war backlash over the NFL’s choice of half-time and pre-game performers.
Trump told the New York Post he plans to skip the 8 February championship game at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara because the trip is “just too far away”, adding that he would have considered attending if it were a shorter flight. The decision means Trump will not repeat his appearance at last year’s Super Bowl in New Orleans, where he became the first sitting US president to attend the NFL’s showcase event.
The president has made high-profile appearances at sporting events a regular feature of his second term, including last year’s Daytona 500, the recent college football national championship and September’s Ryder Cup at Bethpage, New York. Many of those events were held near Florida or the US east coast, within short travel distance of the White House or Trump’s Mar-a-Lago compound.
Trump also criticized the NFL’s entertainment lineup for the Super Bowl, which includes Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny as the half-time headliner and punk rock band Green Day as a pregame act.
“I’m anti-them,” Trump said. “I think it’s a terrible choice. All it does is sow hatred. Terrible.”
In interviews, Trump had previously called the selection of Bad Bunny “absolutely ridiculous” and said he was unfamiliar with the artist. Bad Bunny, born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, has been a vocal critic of Trump and last year performed a month-long concert residency in Puerto Rico rather than touring the mainland United States.
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said in October the league would not reconsider its decision. Speaking after the league’s owners meetings, Goodell said Bad Bunny was chosen because of his global popularity and dismissed the backlash as typical for Super Bowl entertainment. “We’re confident it’s going to be a great show,” Goodell said.
Trump said the presence of Bad Bunny and Green Day had nothing to do with his decision not to attend the game. Green Day has a long history of politically charged lyrics, and lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong has publicly criticized Trump and voiced support for protests against the administration’s immigration policies.
The Super Bowl is the most-watched annual television event in the United States. Last year’s game averaged nearly 130m US viewers, according to NFL figures, with an additional 62.5m watching internationally. The teams competing will be determined after Sunday’s conference championship games between the New England Patriots and Denver Broncos, followed by the Los Angeles Rams and Seattle Seahawks.
